Sunday, July 23, 2017

Colorado State University Reaches Agreement With Wrongly Accused Student

Colorado State University-Pueblo student Grant Neal was
granted some much overdue justice recently. Sort of. A court document filed
July 14th by attorneys representing the university and the state
attorney general says the school reached an agreement with Neal, whose federal
lawsuit seeking damages from Colorado State University-Pueblo also was the
first if its kind to name the Department of Education as a defendant. The agreement, reached “on or about June 9,”
dismisses all remaining claims against the university and its officials. “The
agreement included monetary and a number of non-economic terms,” according to
the status update filed in Colorado federal court.

What
was the reason for Neal’s lawsuit in the first place? Neal, at the time a
talented sophomore fullback for the school’s football team, was suspended in
December of 2015 after Jennifer DeLuna, the university’s “Director of Diversity
and Inclusion,” concluded he had “engaged in non-consensual sexual intercourse”
with athletic trainer and fellow student “Jane Doe.”

Neal
claimed in his lawsuit that investigators ignored exculpatory evidence, including the trainer’s own testimony, in which
she flatly stated the sex was consensual.

“Don’t
listen to her, your honor! What would
she know?”

In
fact, the trainer herself never accused Neal of any wrongdoing whatsoever.
Incredibly, the university’s inquiry into the two student’s sex lives was
triggered by a report to the athletic training department by “Doe’s” friend,
who simply assumed she had been raped when
she saw her sporting a hickey.

Universities
have LGBTQIA “Pride” days, teach classes that discuss the pleasures of oral and
anal sex, are famously tolerant and inclusive of almost any behavior one can
think of…and they suspend a student
because of a “hickey?!?” Even though both
parties to the alleged assault say it wasn’t
an assault?

A hickey? Hickeys were popular
signs of affection back in the straight-laced 40’s and 50’s. June Cleaver
probably had a few. The alleged “raper” and the alleged “rapee” both say there was no rape. Yet, despite
the testimony of the only two people actually involved in the incident/tryst,
the school’s Director of Perversity and Delusion decides to suspend Neal
anyway?

The lawsuit alleged that the
university violated Neal’s due-process rights in following legally non-binding
“guidance” concerning sexual assault investigations from the federal Office for
Civil Rights. (That should’ve been a slam-dunk). Yet the university’s
suspension remains in effect until “Doe” graduates, and has resulted in Neal
losing both his wrestling and his football scholarships, while also limiting
him from pursuing his athletic career at other universities, the lawsuit
stated. This has potentially devastating effects on his future income and
well-being.

In a fit of monumental hubris,
CSU-Pueblo asked the court to dismiss the athlete’s suit a year ago, claiming
he failed to “allege any actual nexus between his gender and his purported
mistreatment.”

According to thecollegefix.com,
Magistrate Judge Craig Shaffer stated this past February that the
investigators’ decision to not interview witnesses favorable to Neal’s story
“all suggest bias and inaccuracy in the outcome.” Shaffer then recommended that
Judge Raymond Moore deny the school’s motion to dismiss, prompting the
following objection from the university: “[T]he Magistrate Judge here has
accepted Plaintiff’s self-serving conjecture, unsupported by a single factual
allegation, that CSU-Pueblo administrators were motivated to adopt a discriminatory
approach towards male students as a result of pressure from federal
authorities.”

“Self-serving?”
He’s the plaintiff. What the hell is he supposed to do, just accept whatever
random punishment the school feels like dishing out? “Conjecture, unsupported
by a single factual allegation?” That would demonstrably be what the trainer’s
“friend” and the university itself engaged in.

Sadly, many modern “institutions of
higher learning” aren’t interested in facts if they don’t support their own
institutional biases and self-serving conjecture.

Daily Trivia Quiz Answer

Today's Answer: Andrew Jackson. ("Poll" got so worked up before the service he apparently had to be removed from the premises, as he was cussing long and loud).

Q) What words appear on the front of the penny, nickel, dime and quarter, alongside the likeness of presidents?

A) "Liberty" and "In God We Trust"

An Ode To Life

Appreciate all you have, as it- and you- will soon be gone. Leave no heartfelt words unspoken, no sweet gesture incomplete, no act of love undone. Love your spouse with passion and abandon, your kids with patience and understanding but also a firm guidance. Love also the truth, no matter how hard. If pursued by enough people with enough courage, it really will set us free.

And don't forget, we didn't ask to be born. We didn't create ourselves. We are not gods. There is a higher power.

Fireworks of the Mind

Write It Up

Whence Shall Come Another?

True Then, True Now

"If you will not fight for right when you can easily win without bloodshed; if you will not fight when your victory is sure and not too costly; you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves."- Winston Churchill

Time Well Wasted

The power lies within your hands To do with what you may But the hourglass is filled with sands Of endless yesterdays